Angelos Postecoglou is Australia's most successful domestic club coach with two premiership titles, four championship titles and a continental title. His appointment at the helm of the Socceroos was greeted by football pundits as a square peg in a square hole. To break clean from the past and mark a new beginning in Australian football, he was courageous enough to put aside the so called golden generation of footballers who took part in their last two World Cup campaigns and give the opportunity to young players to blossom. The squad is littered with players in their early 20s with two uncapped players in Fortuna Dusseldorf forward Ben Halloran and Preston defender Bailey Wright.

“The majority of them have strong seasons this year and I guess for a lot of them, hopefully, they have similar fire in their belly to myself in wanting to prove themselves,' Postecoglou told a news conference in Sydney. “I had some specific criteria; form, fitness and an eye for the future and I think this squad reflects that”, he added. The Greek-born Australian is conscious of the immense task ahead but has no complex in front of world class coaches like Vicente Del Bosque and Filipe Scolari. "We face a formidable challenge in Brazil but it is also a big opportunity and we head to the World Cup with no barriers as we look to write a new chapter in our rich football history," he said.